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Dr. Robert M. Light passed away at the home of his father in Carlsbad, New Mexico at the age of 38.
Bob, as he was known to his colleagues, was born in Carlsbad on August 14, 1959 to Jo Anna Wills Light and Robert S. Light. He spent his formative years in Carlsbad, attending elementary and high school there.
He decided to pursue a career in the physical sciences at the University of Texas, where he graduated with Bachelor degrees in Physics and Astronomy. He continued his education at Yale University, receiving his Master's degree in Philosophy in 1983 and his Ph.D. in Astronomy in 1988 under the guidance of Dr. Robert Zinn. Bob was remembered as an exceptionally generous and hardworking student by his advisor, a sentiment that was expressed by everyone whose lives he touched. The subject of his dissertation at Yale was to analyze the elemental abundances in globular clusters and the dwarf spheroidal satellite galaxies to the Milky Way, by studying the integrated light of those systems. This work was the beginning of his vocation to study the composition and dynamics of such systems throughout his career. It was also the start of his keen interest in developing new software tools that would enable efficient analysis of what was then the relatively new field of digital astronomical imaging with CCD detectors.
Bob's professional employment began with a Post Doctoral appointment at Louisiana State University Dept. of Physics where he worked with Dr. Arlo Landolt. From 1989 to 1992, he worked with Dr. Sandra Faber at the University of California, Santa Cruz Lick Observatory. While at the Lick Observatory, he began participating in analysis of Hubble Space Telescope observations of globular clusters and other stellar collections in and around the Milky Way.
From 1992 until his death, Robert was employed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. During the first three years at JPL, Bob worked with the Hubble Space Telescope Wide-Field/Planetary Camera team led by Dr. James Westphal. He was responsible for developing analysis software to monitor the performance of the instrument, but also made use of his expertise to support and lead scientific investigations using WF/PC observational data.
Beginning in 1995, Bob transferred to the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) team at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at JPL/Caltech. He was the lead engineer/scientist responsible for developing the automated processing software that would ultimately measure the brightness of over one billion stars observed in the digital data collected by 2MASS. Bob was renowned among his colleagues for his gentle demeanor, absolute generosity and quick wit, and his dedication to quality in his professional work. Most who were familiar with his mild facade were surprised to learn that Bob was an accomplished moto-cross racer. He was also an avid cycling enthusiast.
His life was tragically cut short by cancer before he could see the end of the 2MASS survey operations. Bob's work provided a key foundation to an unprecedented software system that is producing astronomical catalogs that will be used scientists for decades to come. These catalogs are already enabling astronomers to probe the structure and constituents of our Galaxy, and to search for exotic objects in the Universe.
In recognition of Robert Light's legacy and contributions to the success of 2MASS, the Survey Team has dedicated the 2MASS Point Source Catalog of photometry of over one billion stars to his memory.
Bibliography of Robert M. Light